It’s a pity that Kevin Williamson’s piece in National Review wasn’t entitled I’m Fat, Dumb, and Happy, because he seems quite content to ignore any bumps in the road that might upset his thesis that politics and politicians don’t matter. This bit raised red flags:
Things look pretty good at home, too. There are things I would prefer to see done differently, and some important problems that are not being treated as seriously as I would prefer. But the nation is at peace, and it is prospering. (For the most part.) Americans have developed a weird, cultish, caesaropapist attitude toward the presidency, without ever stopping to consider that the nation has thrived under the administration of a succession of very different men with very different political agendas: Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and, now, Donald Trump: The fact that America just keeps on trucking irrespective of the qualities or character of the man in the Oval Office ought to make us think rather less of the presidency and rather more of ourselves — and think better of our neighbors, our businesses, our public institutions, our civil society, and much else — including the citizens who do not share our political views.
Thrived under all those Presidents? Has Kevin forgotten the Great Recession incident? The amassing of a huge debt during the Bush and Trump Administrations? The travails of the economy during the early part of the Bush Administration? The anger of the middle class at the bailouts handed to the large banks?
I was there. I watched us limp our way out, making decisions which, in retrospect, may have been questionable even if necessary.
But to argue these inexcusably smoothed over abysses in grand detail is not my purpose, because I want to point out how these deliberate omissions work against Williamson – by damaging his credibility. If he can’t acknowledge the bumps and twists and mistakes and that they affected the nation, then why should the reader really trust anything he says? Indeed, if he’s going to present an analysis, rather than a pleasantly rose-colored glasses view of the past, he cannot start with flawed facts.
And it’s a pity, as I thought this insight – true or not – concerning partisans was interesting:
At that level, this is about something other than politics per se. I have spent about 30 years covering political protests of various kinds, and, of course, people rarely show up at a protest because they are happy about something. But many of the people one encounters at such events (from Occupy Wall Street to the tea-party rallies) are categorically unhappy, bereft and adrift in a way that is only tangentially related to politics. They turn to politics to provide a sense of meaning that might once have been provided by family or religion, two anchors from which many of us enlightened moderns have cut ourselves away. But politics provides a sense of meaning only when we convince ourselves that there is a great deal at stake. I do not know how many planning-and-zoning meetings I have been to, how many suburban school-board meetings and small-town municipal board meetings. Rarely does one get the sense that there is much that is urgent going on. They are boring, and, generally, free of drama. (Not always. A visit with the San Bernardino, Calif., city leadership will cause one to despair for democracy.) That isn’t very much compared to communing with God or being a father. The people who fall into politics as a source of personal meaning must believe that what’s at stake is . . . everything . . . or at least something meaningful, otherwise — well, that’s obvious enough. Political fanaticism is not rooted in ideology. It is the hollow clanging sound that social life makes when banging up against an empty soul.
Although, on a second reading, the ending reads as more patronizing than anything. There’s a point to be made that most of us think we’re the center of the Universe, or that our concerns are vital to the greater community, and often that’s just not so. But this is more of an effort, I think, to discredit partisans in hopes of discouraging the newcomers, who, according to polls, are generally more Democratic than Republican. Portray those who concern themselves with the parties as being an “empty soul,” and maybe some of those darn new Democrats will be intimidated into leaving.
